"Thou art mad, nurse," answered Penelope pettishly, turning in her bed
and rubbing her eyes; "why mockest thou me in my sorrow with thy
folly? and why hast thou disturbed me in the sweetest sleep that ever
I had since the fatal, the accursed day when my lord sailed for Troy?
But for thy years and thy faithful service I would have paid thee
unkindly for this wanton insult"

"Heaven forbid that I should mock or insult thee, dear child!" cried
the nurse, her eyes filling with tears. "I have told thee naught but
the truth. The stranger whom we thought a beggar was Odysseus himself.
Telemachus knew this all the time, but kept it from thee by the
command of his father."

"May the gods ever bless thee for these tidings!" said Penelope,
springing from the couch, and throwing her arms round the nurse's
neck. "But tell me truly, how did he with his single hand gain the
mastery over such a multitude?"

"I saw not how it was done," answered Eurycleia. "I heard but the
groans of the men as they were stricken, for I was shut up with the
handmaids in the women's chamber. When it was over, he called me, and
I found him standing among the slain, like a lion by his prey. It was
a sight to gladden thy heart."

But Penelope's first impulse of joyful surprise had passed, and a cold
fit of doubt and distrust succeeded, "It cannot be!" she murmured;
"some god has taken the likeness of my husband, and slain the wooers."
Even when Eurycleia told her how she had discovered the scar, while
washing the feet of Odysseus, she remained unshaken in her unbelief.
"The counsels of the gods," she said, "are beyond our knowing, and
they can take upon them disguises too deep for a poor woman's wit. But
come, let us go and see the slaughtered wooers, and their slayer,
whoever he be."

II

Odysseus was sitting bowed over the fire, which shone redly on his
face, as he leaned his head upon his hand. He was still clothed in his
beggar's rags, and strangely disfigured by the magic power of Athene;
while the red stains of slaughter, which still lay thick upon him,
served to render his disguise yet deeper. Small wonder then that
Penelope hesitated long to acknowledge him for her husband, as she sat
some way off scanning his features with timid yet attentive gaze, like
one who strives to decipher a blurred and blotted manuscript. More
than once she started up, as if about to fall upon his neck; then the
gleam which had lighted up her face died away, her